Missed our Global Frontline Experience Summit 2022? It was pretty awesome but don’t worry, all of the powerful sessions are available right here!
Who we heard from:
Ethan Andelman is the Marketing Executive for respected financial services firm Lendmark. He works with millions of customer touchpoints every day and understands how important it is to get the basics right.
The BIG idea:
Lendmark is on a mission to be America's preferred consumer lender and empowering their 1600+ frontline employees to help them is key to achieving this goal. The company’s recent focus on using real time frontline feedback to help them coach for small improvements is now a cornerstone of their customer experience playbook.
Uncovering the truth about ‘where you’re at’
We’ve all been in that meeting where a topic or KPI or feedback is being discussed, and to find out a little more, someone invariably asks: “Should we do a survey?”
Ethan admits surveys have a purpose and undeniable benefits, but they also come with their own challenges.
“They can be expensive; they are often reactive; and sometimes, by the time you collate the results, might even be obsolete.”
Ethan had one objective at the beginning of their customer experience journey – to find out the truth.
"If you’re looking for the truth, you need to go after real time, relationship-oriented feedback and not just transactional data – which seems to make up the majority of survey focus these days.”
Last year, Lendmark kicked off its refresh customer experience program by integrating a real-time customer feedback platform (they use the AskNicely offering). It’s taken time to get it right and to ensure that they’re asking the right questions and getting the most useful feedback possible – but now Ethan calls the few seconds it takes to get truly valuable insights from their customers the ‘20 seconds of magic’.
Sharing that truth to drive business advantage
.png)
believes Ethan.
In his line of work, Ethan often observes a disconnect between what we ask our frontline people to do every day; and what organisations are willing to share with those same teams.
Since taking a decision to share real-time, unfiltered feedback with Lendmark’s frontliners, Ethan has noticed some striking changes:
- It’s easier to reveal blind spots – We’re all human - we get into our roles, our daily habits - and sometimes we miss the bigger picture. Feedback is the ‘fresh eyes’ we need to help us notice the faded poster on the wall, or a process that could use an update so that we can ‘see it, respond to it and make it better’.
- It’s easier to celebrate success – It’s no secret that happy employees deliver better results. Using real time customer feedback makes it so easy to notice successes, and make a quick phone call or send an email to celebrate them. Those moments go a long way and make an impact on morale. As Ethan says, “A rising tide lifts all boats!”
- It’s easier to keep a handle on NPS – Real-time feedback makes measuring up-to-the minute NPS a lot easier. There are plenty of studies to show that there is a direct correlation between NPS and meeting KPIs, including that a 7 point increase in NPS leads to a 1% increase in revenue and if you reduce detractors by 2%, you’ll see almost the same amount of revenue growth (The London School of Economics). Put another way, measuring NPS and acting on that is an effective way to drive organisational outcomes.
When talking to one of his frontline managers recently about what access to real time feedback has done for the team, Ethan reports that their actions spoke volumes: one manager admitted to logging in over 20 times in just 5 days!
Want to find out why his people love getting their hands on real time data and put your NPS on this trajectory too? Click on the link at the top of this article to watch Ethan’s full presentation.
